Funded by an Adopt-a-Minefield grant, MAG spent part of September in one of the more marginalised hamlets of Quang Binh province, conducting mobile operations to reduce the risk of injury or death from unexploded ordnance (UXO) that have been an ever-present threat since the war with America in the 1960s and '70s.
The majority of the inhabitants of Dong Tien Hamlet (in Quang Tien Commune, Quang Trach District) live under the US$1-a-day poverty line and only started receiving electricity this year.
The 141 people living in 32 households earn around VND400,000 ($25) per month, predominantly by selling conical hats to farmers in the area – a trade that has gone on since well before the war, but one which brings in only VND2,000 (US12 cents) a hat.
 |
| Hoang Thi Hoa makes hats – which sell at VND2,000 (US12 cents) – with her nine-year-old daughter Nga |
During the winter months, sales of hats drop. With soil very poor, exhausted from over-farming, and people afraid to open up new farming areas due to the UXO remaining in the area, families often have to sell livestock or borrow from relatives to buy rice and vegetables instead of growing their own crops.
By addressing the reported threats faced by small, rural communities, MAG is trying to ensure that people, such as those living in Dong Tien Hamlet, don’t remain trapped in poverty.
House-to-house ‘Mobile Operations’ are undertaken as a method to effectively respond to the needs of those actually threatened by UXO and quickly remove all known dangerous items within villages.
These ‘Mobile Ops’ complement the work of the Vietnamese Army, who are focused more on clearing land in support of national and provincial priorities.
While conducting mobile operations in the village from September 6 – 21, MAG Vietnam’s Mine Action Team No.2 (MAT 2), performed 95 explosive ordnance disposal (EOD) tasks, locating and destroying 34 cluster bombs, along with other assorted UXO, including high explosive projectiles and a mortar round.
Before this work, MAG spoke to 31-year-old Mai Van Nhat, who together with his wife makes three conical hats per day. He said: “We are afraid of the bombs, we are afraid to let our children play in the garden, we are afraid to let our cattle graze in the hills, and we are afraid to dig wells to water the soil. We are still poor, just because of bombs and mines.”
Scrap metal
When the hamlet was first resettled in 1992, a number of the men became scrap metal collectors when they saw an opportunity to turn the remnants of conflict into cash. Fifteen years later there are very few men in the hamlet still collecting scrap as a source of income, even though the demand for metal in Vietnam is driving prices up.
 |
"Everyone is afraid of gardening or farming on their land because of the fear of bombs" - Hoang Van Chung |
Yet, even feeling this financial squeeze, and with a wife and three children to provide for, he has not been tempted yet to re-enter his former occupation as a scrap metal collector, which lasted for only one month in 1992, when he was 19 years old.
Mr Chung sold his metal detector after his 22-year-old brother was killed while digging up a cluster bomb in the hamlet. The two brothers had pooled their resources together to invest in a metal detector when they saw other men making up to VND500,000 ($31.25) a day picking up and processing scrap metal. As they were inexperienced they did not know that most scrap collectors leave the small, baseball-sized cluster bombs alone.
“When you talk of seeing a bomb you can see the fear on people’s faces,” said Mr Chung. “Because of the fear our minds are not stable to concentrate on work. Everyone is afraid of gardening or farming on their land because of the fear of bombs.”
Now that Mr Chung has seen the work MAG is capable of, he hopes that the UXO-free land can now be developed. He said he hopes that one day a factory may be built near the commune so that he could apply for a job.
Links:
Back to top
